


And I’m Fine With Being Used

by figure8



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Bittersweet, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, Pseudo-Incest, this is fucked up man i'm sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-14
Updated: 2015-12-14
Packaged: 2018-05-04 13:22:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5335634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/figure8/pseuds/figure8
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dick learns to be what Jason needs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And I’m Fine With Being Used

**Author's Note:**

> i care about continuity just as much as the next gal, but dc _doesn't_ , so this is a mess. it's an alternate universe anyway so who cares but it's a mix between pre-crisis and new 52 and eh. honestly i don't know. it borrows elements from pretty much any batman or nightwing comic i've ever read. insert shrug emoji! 
> 
> i haven't written anything dc-related in years, and this is my first try at batman fanfic in english?? i'm so sorry?? not beta-read because why would i make my life easier. i swear i do my best
> 
> title from lead on by phillip phillips, THE jaydick hymn. please listen to this song it ruined me

“Get down here, brother mine,” Jason demands with a smirk, tugging at Dick’s collar.

“Don't say shit like that,” Dick hisses. He can feel his face reddening already, and it can’t be shame, not after all this time.

Jason smiles lazily, trails his hand down Dick’s chest. “But it gets you hard,” he mewls, the bastard.

He’s right, but Dick won’t give him that. “I’m serious, cut it out.” He kisses Jason’s nose absently, still thinking about what Tim told him on the phone.

“Hey,” Jason says, and this time his voice is devoid of teasing, and it sounds deeper somehow, “you okay?”

Dick sighs, “Yeah. It’s just—Tim said that Dad—Tim said that _Bruce_. Bruce misses us.” He can see the start of a grimace stretching Jason’s lips, and no, this is exactly why they don’t have this kind of conversations. “Forget about it,” he grits, closes his eyes.

“You’re upset.” For all his bravado, all his careless—frankly shitty sometimes—attitude, Jason is so selfless where Dick is concerned, so strangely focused. It’s easy to forget it, even like this, even when it’s just the two of them. But here they are, and Jason might hate Bruce, he might never want to talk to their—to their _family_ ever again, he knows it’s much more complicated for Dick, and he respects that. Dick feels an absurd, overwhelming surge of love for the ridiculous, beautiful man in his bed. He bends down to kiss him, this time fully conscious and aiming directly for his mouth. Jason’s lips part immediately for him, pliant and warm, and Dick lets himself sink into the familiar comfort, the sweetness of his mouth. It’s been too many years for the electricity between them to only be the danger, the illicit aspect of it. It has to be something else, something more, and Dick isn’t ready for what that means. It’s stupid, he knows. He and Jason have said worse, and much more important things to each other than these three little words. And deep inside, he has known for a long time. You don’t run away just with anyone, you don’t fuck up your life over…—he doesn’t even know what this is. He used to think it was just sex, he truly did. Mind-blowing, criminally addictive sex; but still only carnal, only temporary. Jason bites his jaw and then sucks a bruise right under, where the skin of his throat is tender and sensitive. Dick’s hips buck into thin air, and he huffs out a frustrated whine.

“Be patient, baby,” Jason murmurs into his collarbone.

He tosses his head back and allows Jason to take from him, and Jason takes and takes and takes.

(It was always something more.)

 

\--

 

“He’s not my father!” Jason snarls, furious. And it hurts Dick more than it should, and it’s ridiculous, because all the venom in Jason’s angry rumble is for Bruce, but it means—

It means not being a family, and that, in turn, means Jason isn’t bound to them. Jason could leave anytime. And that’s not a possibility Dick wants to even entertain, okay. That’s not something he even wants to _think about_.

But he does. He thinks about it all the time.

 

\--

 

**_Billionaire Bruce Wayne adopts young circus orphan—is it all for publicity?_ **

 

\--

 

Dick remembers his life before Wayne Manor. He was young, not an infant. He remembers. He remembers his mother’s gentle smile and the way her body twisted and bent, how she could curl around a cable and undulate like a snake, gorgeous and scary and powerful. He remembers his father, huge but lean, all subtle muscle and weary grins, and how it felt to have his hand on Dick’s shoulder, how it felt to have him be proud of Dick.

It isn’t the same, with Bruce. There’s an emptiness, a hole in him that nothing can fill. Dick used to take it personally—he doesn’t anymore. He’s not stupid, he knows Bruce loves him best, no matter what he himself tells the youngsters. It’s a heavy burden, sometimes, being Bruce Wayne’s pride and joy. But Dick knows he’s the one best fit for the role, so he grits his teeth and moves along. He learned _that_ lesson early on, before Batman, before Bruce Wayne. He’s a circus boy, after all. No matter how hard it gets, you pack up your things and you move on to the next city, to the next show. So it’s not that difficult, shedding his Robin costume and moving on to the next city, to the next stop of his life. It’s not that difficult. He’s done it before.

 

\--

 

Dick just turned sixteen when Bruce brings a boy back with him one night. He looks twelve, thirteen at max, and his shoulders seem constantly set in an angry line. When Dick inquires as to what the _hell_ exactly is going on, the boy shrugs and says “I tried to steal his car tires. I wasn’t fast enough.” Bruce, on the other hand, doesn’t say anything. Dick should be getting used to this crap by now, but he’s dealing with puberty on the side of being half a superhero, so he can’t help but think he should be allowed one meltdown a semester. Especially if his Not-Dad is going to be bringing home strays.

“When I said I wished I had a brother,” he tells Bruce a week later during patrol, his tone light like he’s telling a joke, “I wasn’t being serious.”

He’s almost certain he sees Bruce smirk furtively under his cowl. “Too bad, we’re keeping him.”

 

\--

 

Dick is Nightwing, and Jason is Robin, and Bruce is still Batman, obviously. Bruce is and always will be Batman. It’s weird and exhilarating, being his own person, his own hero. Dick feels too young and too old simultaneously, and it can’t all come from growing up too quickly.

He comes back home often and misses home even more often. Alfred bakes him cookies and allows him to dump his dirty laundry at the Manor once a week. Dick suspects it’s only an excuse for both Bruce and himself to find themselves in the same space more than once every blue moon. It’s weird and exhilarating and _exhausting_ , being his own person, his own hero. He doesn’t know how, at first. He’s always been an addendum, a complement. It’s always been “and Robin”. He thinks of Jason, of his furious eyes and the violence he hides away inside his chest, and he is afraid. Jason exists precariously between two tectonic plates. He’s what comes after the _and_ but also an _after_. He’s a sleeping volcano, calm for now but ready to explode. If Dick, who’s always thought of himself as an ocean—potentially lethal but serene, stable—feels like a jarring ship, then what’s holding his time bomb of a little brother together?

 

\--

 

“You were never quite brothers,” Alfred will say later, much later. “He took you in just a little too late for that, I’m afraid.”

“I swear I tried,” Dick will say, but it will taste bitter like a lie at the tip of his tongue.

 

\--

 

Jason dies.

 

\--

 

Grief grabs Dick by the throat and never lets him go. He misses the funeral. He misses a lot, truth be told, and he stops keeping count. Bruce puts Jason’s uniform on display like some sort of sacrifice to the deity of guilt, and the first time Dick enters the Batcave and sees it he feels like retching. He never saw pictures but he can imagine, _he keeps imagining_ , Jason’s small body broken in ways no body should be broken, bruised like a young fruit, shattered like a bird. He keeps imagining, what if I had been more present what if I had been a brother what if I had been there what if

 

\--

 

Jason dies and Dick Grayson lets go of Robin.

 

\--

 

“Little wing,” he whispers against Jason’s ribs, marveling at the way Jason shivers when touched by his breath, “I am so glad you are here.”

 

\--

 

Jason comes back because he is a flame, he is a forest fire and nothing can stop the burning, not even death. The hair falling like a curtain in front of his piercing eyes is white as snow. He has pain and loneliness piling up like spun glass at the back of his throat. The gleaming flicker of insanity behind his irises is enough to make Dick shake silently. He wears red and signs his name in bullets and fear, writes his side of the story opposite the Batman’s.

Dick catches a glimpse of him in a dark alley in Bludhaven, and he knows. He would recognize the fluidity of these movements anywhere. _This is my brother_ , a voice sings inside his head. _My brother is alive._

 

\--

 

_Who do you hate?_

_Batman._

 

\--

 

The sole of Jason’s shoe connects with his breastbone, and Dick huffs out a pained sound. His back collides with the brick wall behind him, and he wheezes for a moment, desperately trying to catch his breath. Jason doesn’t give him the time, socks him square in the jaw. In a blur, Dick thinks gratefully about the fact his guns are still holstered.

“Hit me back, you coward!” Jason yells. Dick can taste blood in his mouth, and his chest feels concave.

“Why do we always have to fight?” he asks, and he sounds tired even to his own ears. He sounds old.

Jason doesn’t answer for a long time; doesn’t move, either. Then, a hoarse whisper: “Because it’s the only thing I know.” It’s a weary confession, almost a peace offering in how much it must have cost Jason to utter these words. Dick takes his time savoring it.

“Jay,” he says, calls. Raises his hand slowly, touches Jason’s face, his throat, his collar. “You _died_ ,” he says brokenly, and it’s not at all what he was planning to tell him when he started talking.

“Yeah,” Jason shrugs. “It was a wild ride.” Dick’s fingertips are resting on his collarbone, and he can feel the blood running under, _real_ , alive. “What you gonna do, Dickie? Gonna catch me, tie me up and bring me back to daddy? Bet he’ll be real proud.”

“No,” Dick says, strangled. “No, Jay, _God_.”

“I’m going to kill him, Dick. I will not rest until they are both dead, him and the clown.”

“No,” Dick says again.

Jason hits him again. He feels his lip split, the trickle of blood trailing down his chin. Jason stares at him for a short moment and then he just—bends down and licks it. His tongue touches Dick’s lips for less than a second but it feels like being electrocuted. Jason must have sensed it too, because he freezes, looks for an answer in Dick’s blue eyes. He doesn’t find one—or maybe he does.

He kisses Dick so fucking _gently_ , so careful, it’s almost an insult. The hands cupping Dick’s face are the hands of a killer, hands that have bruised him and pushed him and hurt him but they are soft and steady now. Jason kisses him like he’s drinking water from a fountain, avidly but painstakingly cautious. The entire thing feels surreal, and it doesn’t last long enough for Dick to memorize everything he wants to about it, and then Jason is just gone. Gone. Disoriented, Dick grabs uselessly at the wall behind him. He thinks of Jason watching him hungrily in the night, years ago. He thinks of Jason learning his moves by heart, until one could not distinguish between their two bodies. He thinks of the wary distance they both put between one another, always at arm’s reach but never too close.

He thinks, _oh_.

 

\--

 

“Jason is alive,” he tells Bruce.

 

Bruce goes white as a sheet and then faintly green, and then he locks himself in the Batcave for hours. Dick tries not to think about the weight of Jason’s body pressed against his and fails.

 

 _Jason wants to kill you_ , he doesn’t tell Bruce.

 

\--

 

“Fuck me,” Jason asks, begs, and Dick has to bite his still-sore lip to refrain from saying something ridiculous like _I’m gonna make love to you_ and he just nods instead. They fumble in the dark and it’s clumsy and perfect. He traces Jason’s autopsy scar with his tongue and kisses the crescent-shaped marks on the inside of his wrists. _You are alive_ , he wonders silently, awe oozing from his mouth, pouring itself into every kiss. They move together like they do on a battlefield, only it is better, because Jason is _with him_ , not against him. Dick’s never wanted anyone like he wants him. _He’s barely seventeen_ , he thinks fleetingly, and then he pushes that thought far, far away. _He’s your brother_ , he thinks less fleetingly, and the voice inside his head sounds alarmingly like Bruce’s.

“Harder,” Jason moans. “Dickie…”

Dick closes his eyes and links their fingers and ignores the insisting sound of the wind against the windows.

 

\--

 

Bruce, creature of logic and disbelief that he is, demands a DNA test, and then another one because he does not believe the first. And then another one. He accepts that Jason is truly back after the fourth one because science does not lie, even when Bruce Wayne wants it to.

“You need to bring him back to Gotham immediately,” he tells Dick over the phone.

Dick tightens his grip around the receiver so hard he hears the plastic starting to snap. “No,” he says, and it’s the first time he’s disobeyed a direct order from the Batman.

“Richard,” Bruce says, and it sounds strained. He just says that, _Richard_ , as if it holds some kind of power of persuasion over Dick. It _does_ , kind of, but it’s not enough. It’s not nearly enough. Jason slides in behind him wordlessly, plasters his chest to Dick’s back, skin on skin. He mouths at Dick’s jawline lazily and curls his fingers around Dick’s hand, takes the phone from him. Dick lets him hang up.

“Come back to bed, Dickie,” Jason asks languidly.

 

Dick fucks him into the mattress, hard, hard enough to leave bruises for days. He catches Jason pressing his fingers curiously onto the purple stains in front of the bathroom mirror. They were both raised in a culture of pain. They were _rewarded_ for pain. They sought it, played with it, bathed in it _._ He feels guilty. He feels ecstatic.

 

\--

 

He wraps Jason in a virtual cocoon and hopes for the best. They hunt together, fight together, and Dick can only hope his thirst for blood will be satiated without a detour by Gotham. It’s a forlorn wish, but he makes it anyway.

 

\--

 

“You’re sleeping with him,” Bruce says coldly after Dick refuses to let him see Jason for the seventh time.

“That’s none of your business,” Dick grits. He feels oddly exposed under his Nightwing suit, like Bruce can see through it. Bruce sees through _him_ , and aren’t he and the suit one and the same?

“You’re my sons,” Bruce says, clearly offended.

“You do not get to play that card.” Dick is angry, suddenly. It’s boiling right under his flesh. “Not after you abandoned him—not after you _left him for dead_ —”

“Richard,” Bruce says calmly, “this is not you I hear.”

 

 _Maybe I am becoming him,_ Dick thinks fiercely. _He could never quite become me._

\--

 

Dick wakes up to the sound of people whispering furiously in his kitchen. He’s sleeping in today—patrol was particularly rough and it’s Sunday anyway. He rolls over, expecting the warmth of Jason’s still sleeping form, but he touches an empty cold spot. That’s when he turns completely alert and recognizes the two voices coming muffled from the other side of the wall. If he concentrates, he can even make out what they’re saying. _Of course_ Bruce wouldn’t keep it at that. Dick is surprised it took him that much time, actually. He almost goes for the door, ready to kick him out of _his_ apartment, but then he really listens to the tone of Jason’s voice. It’s steady. Not assured, and almost trembling, but it’s a civil conversation. It’s not Dick’s place to step in. It’s not Dick’s place to overhear either, but he’s never pretended to be perfect.

“Is it because I’m queer?” Jason asks, and Dick’s chest constricts at the uncertainty in his usually confident tenor.

“That would be highly hypocritical of me,” Bruce replies, and wow. Okay. Dick never thought he would hear _that one_ before turning at least fifty. It might be easier for Bruce to say it when he’s wearing the suit, he guesses. One more obstacle between Bruce Wayne and reality.

“I don’t know how to be someone who doesn’t want him,” Jason says, and he sounds so awfully young.

It takes a long, long time for Bruce to answer. _Then don’t be_ , Dick wants to open the door and yell. _Don’t be_. But it isn’t his question to answer. “I have—trained myself,” Bruce begins. “To not want the things I want. I has occurred to me, lately, that this might have been a mistake.” It pains him to say that, Dick knows. Batman does not admit to miscalculations. “I know I was never… I know I failed you. I wasn’t the father figure you needed or deserved.”

Dick can hear Jason chuckle bitterly. “Yeah, right.”

“You can—talk to me. If you ever feel the need.”

“I would honestly rather die a second time,” Jason deadpans. “Please do not give me the Talk.” Bruce makes a small horrified sound. There is something that feels terribly akin to longing in Dick’s chest.

 

When Bruce leaves, Jason discards his boxers and climbs back into bed and buries his nose in the crook of Dick’s neck. He just stays there, breathing heavily, muscles tense.

“There were seven sharp kitchen knives,” Dick observes, not unkindly. “You could have stabbed him. You could have _tried_ ,” he amends when Jason laughs. It tickles.

“I’m a sissy,” he sighs finally.

Dick stares at him severely. “Don’t fucking say that.”

“I can’t kill him.”

“I know,” Dick smiles. “I’ve known since you first said you would.”

“I’ve killed people, Dick.”

“I know,” Dick says again.

“You have a killer in your bed. How does that sit with your—whatever, bat-code?”

“I have my brother in my bed, I think I have other issues to deal with before I feel the need to analyze what you do in your spare time.”

Jason grins at that, obviously. “I can’t believe daddy dearest gave us his blessing. This family truly is fucked-up.” He climbs onto Dick’s lap, straddles him. The kiss they exchange is sweet and soft until it’s not, and then Dick parts his lips and Jason is licking into his mouth, hungry, grinding down on him. When they have to catch their breath they do not part, trading hot air mouth to mouth and then diving back in, until Dick feels used and _good_ and so hard he thinks he might die. He throws his head back, eyelids shut as Jason shuffles through the nightstand’s drawer. His breath catches in his throat when he opens his eyes to see Jason opening himself up on three fingers, lube dripping down his thighs. He wants to suck him off. He wants to bend him over and fuck him. He wants—he _wants_. Jason groans, focused, biting his tongue.

“C’mon, Jaybird,” Dick coaxes him.

“Yeah,” Jason exhales hazily. “ _Ah_ , shit, spread your legs.” He lowers himself on Dick’s cock slowly, grabs one hip for balance and puts his other hand on the bed. He begins rocking back and forth in rhythm and Dick’s toes curl on the white sheets. It’s always a surprise, somehow, how fucking good Jason feels around him.

“Baby,” Dick raises a hand to touch Jason’s face, traces the thin line of his lips, “You’re beautiful.”

“Shut the fuck up, _Jesus_.” Their pace is steady, now. They know each other. Their bodies know each other. Dick pushes himself up, holding their weight on one strong arm, until their chests are touching. It changes the angle and Jason moans, his forehead falling on Dick’s shoulder. Dick bites gently at the back of his neck, murmuring sweet nothings. “M’close,” Jason grunts. “Touch me, _Dickie_.”

Kissing the corner of Jason’s mouth, Dick wraps his fingers around Jason’s length, stroking him hard and fast. “C’mon, baby, come for me.” He synchronizes the movement of his hand with little thrusts upwards, and Jason gasps “F—uck, _fuck_ ,” and comes all over both of them. He whines when Dick pulls out, grabs him by the hair and kisses him deep and wet.

“Touch yourself,” he whispers hoarsely when he pulls back. “I wanna see.”

Dick takes himself in hand and starts fucking his fist, low groans escaping his lips. “Jay,” he says dazedly. “Jay, I love you.”

“I know,” Jason smiles. Dick’s orgasm rips through him unexpectedly, shaking him from the inside out. “I know,” Jason says again, stroking his hair. He presses small kisses to Dick’s jawline and it feels better than hearing _I love you too_.

 

\--

 

Dick takes a day job with the BHPD. It’s rewarding if not easy, it gives him something to do during the day, it’ll give him access to files and people he needs to solve the corruption problem in the city, and above all, it’s _his_.

The first time Jason sees him in his uniform he proceeds to laugh about him for fifteen minutes straight. But then he drops to his knees and sucks Dick off, and he calls him _Officer_ in bed that night, so really, Dick is the real winner there.

 

Jason uses his existing contacts to make more contacts, and those contacts to dismantle trafficking rings. Arguably, they’re pretty much doing the same job. Dick carries a gun because he has to, and so Jason does too (one guns, two guns… who’s counting) and Dick cannot say anything, and he’s not comfortable with that, but it is what it is. When he catches Dick eying his thigh holsters one too many times, and not in a _fun_ way, Jason sighs tiredly and takes the guns out.

“Count the fucking bullets, Boy Wonder. Go on. Then count my ammo stock. I only shoot when I have to. I told you.”

Dick knows he should feel guilty, and he does to some extent, but he refuses to just blush and look down. “You’re the one who keeps insisting you’re a killer.”

“This is my code, Dick. If I have to, I will shoot. And I shoot to kill. If you can’t accept that, then I’m sorry, but we’re going to have a problem.”

“It’s _my_ city,” Dick grits.

“Should’ve thought of that before inviting the wolf into the den, pretty boy.” Jason threads a hand through his hair, messing it up even more. “Listen. Fuck, Dick, I really don’t want to fight.”

Dick is scared. Every time he looks at Jason, he is scared. If he made the wrong call, if he miscalculated because he’s _blind_ , because he’s following his dick, people are going to die. _Bruce_ is going to die. “I’m sorry,” he says softly. “I’m tired, I snapped. I had a really bad day at the station.”

Unexpectedly, Jason smiles fondly and opens his arms wide. “Come here, you giant baby. You push yourself too hard,” he whispers in Dick’s ear when he buries himself into Jason’s embrace. “You’re gonna kill yourself out there.” There’s genuine worry in his voice. It’s—strange. Dick feels warm.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbles again in the crook of Jason’s neck.

“Don’t go out tonight,” Jason asks. “I’ll cover for you.”

Dick thinks about protesting, and then he thinks again about the sparkle of fear in Jason’s gaze he caught earlier. “Okay,” he nods. “Okay.”

 

\--

 

They’re partners. He feels fully alive for the first time in forever.

 

\--

 

The first Christmas, they don’t actually realize it’s the first Christmas they’re spending _alone_ , because this… thing between them is still new and they can’t take their hands off each other. Alfred sends a card. Dick pins it to the fridge with a magnet shaped like a balloon.

 

The second Christmas, Jason pretends he doesn’t care and Dick cannot pretend he doesn’t care and they end up angry at each other and it sucks and Alfred sends a card, again. Dick catches Jason staring at it on the 26th, turning it and returning it in his hands as if it would change the signature on the back.

 

\--

 

“Tim called again,” Jason informs Dick over dinner. His police uniform is thrown on their ratty couch, and he’s in serious need of a shower but he was too hungry to wait. Jason is wearing sweatpants hanging low on his hips and a white tank top, and for a second Dick is too distracted by the sight of his back muscles rolling under the fabric to pay attention to what his lover just said.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“The Replacement called,” Jason rolls his eyes.

Dick raises an eyebrow, disbelieving. “And you picked up? What happened, caller ID died on you?”

“You were upset yesterday,” Jason shrugs, as if that is explanation enough. “You want to see them. M’not gonna be in the way of that. I know about family, Grayson. I don’t have to have one to know.”

“I’m your family,” Dick says automatically.

Jason’s eyes turn soft. “Yeah, you are.” He pushes the steaks from the pan into their plates, and sits down across the table, facing Dick.

“I love you,” Dick says, because it feels important that he knows right at this moment.

“I am aware,” Jason grins.

 

\--

 

In the end, one way or another, robins always find their way back to the nest.

**Author's Note:**

> i have never written anything so self-indulgent i should be ashamed of myself goodbye


End file.
